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NOTE: Some people get really offended by poop. If you are offended by anything remotely related to poop, pooping, and bodily functions that are PERFECTLY NATURAL and NORMAL you have been warned. This post may not be to your level of comfort.

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Last Saturday I capped off a typical Adams Morgan night of fun with the ever-tasty and ever-reliable Pizza Mart jumbo slice. If you are like me, you pack that sucker with chili pepper and garlic powder. I had not had Pizza Mart in ages so you can imagine how excited I was (Though I’m willing to bet those beers earlier in the day had some kind of effect). My mouth was on fire and the next morning, when all the beer and pizza had digested, so was my butt. WHAT THE BLEEP…? That question ran through my brain as I sat on the toilet. In All Caps and everything. I wondered why that day’s morning toilet pow wow felt different from the rest, made a mental list of what I had eaten the previous day, and when I got to “Pizza Mart, chili, garlic,” I knew why.

I had to confirm my theory and so I went to my friends, the trusted ones who would not judge or make fun of me for asking questions about their poop and my poop. The ones who would not laugh in my face or, if they did, they would laugh in my face and then say in an apologetic and then sympathetic tone, “No, really. I’m sorry. Okay, I’m going to Google this right now.” My roommate, Rebecca, Googled “spicy poop” and found a blog with a person who asked the same question. My friend, Sara, said she’d ask her friend Lauren who works at the NIH and was on her way to becoming a doctor.

Here’s the diagnosis:

11:47 AM Sara: i’m talkign to lauren about spicy poop

me: lol

what’s the word?

11:48 AM Sara: me: if you eat really really spicy food, is it normal for the poop to burn when it comes out?
Lauren: i think so — the cells there are very delicate
and a lot of the spicy probably isn’t broken down during digestion

me: YES

Sara: you’re not crazy!

me: YAY!

Sara: and:

plus, it may cause extra stomach acid to be produced that gets mixed in and that would burn too

So there you go. If you’ve ever thought, No way! because the thought of having burning sensations down there due to spicy foods sounded crazy, don’t worry you’re not. There’s a scientific explanation for that.